“Right,” Ky said. “Can they stay in the embassy until the shuttle leaves?”
Zar nodded. “It would be advisable. They’ve been in transient housing—you have anything back there? If so, I’ll send a uniformed runner for it.”
“We didn’t want to leave anything, the way things were,” Li said. “Our duffel’s with us.”
“Good,” Zar said. “I’m afraid the accommodations aren’t great—you’ll have to share space with the embassy’s guard detachment, and we’ve cancelled all leave and liberty. Captain, if you’ll come this way—and Li, I’ll send someone to take you to the guard quarters shortly.”
“Thank you, Captain Vatta,” Li said. “We hoped—and of course Vatta…”
“Come on, Captain,” Zar said.
“We’ll have them escorted to the shuttle station tomorrow,” Zar said when they got into the next room. “Shouldn’t be any trouble, I hope. It’s a big help, your taking them off our hands like this. We really don’t have room here to shelter them; we’ve got a half-dozen merchant families, resident here for years, who are coming in tomorrow for the duration, plus the children of a dozen more, and we’re going to be crowded. We’re setting up dormitories upstairs…” He shook his head. “But that’s not your affair. Let’s see about that check—wait, here’s the schedule of standard payments. If you need to file a protest…”
Ky’s implant compared the cost of standard rations from a chandler at the orbital station to the reimbursement.
“No, that’s fine,” she said. “Do you have a comset I can use to contact my ship and let them know what’s coming?”
“Of course, Captain Vatta. Secure set, right over here—” A cabinet in the corner of the room. While Zar began the surprisingly lengthy process of transferring embassy funds to her account, she contacted Riel Amat on board ship, and explained the situation, sending along the personnel files, and told him to go on and order supplies.
“Are you sure about this, Captain?” Amat asked. “Four strangers? And with a war starting?”
“The embassy vouched for them; it was an official request. They were stranded because of a quarantine matter—their ship wouldn’t wait. And now they’re subject to conscription, the consul said.Garysaid we’d need help reconfiguring those machines to get into our holds. The embassy’s paying their mess expenses—”
“But no passage fee?”
“No. And yes, I know we need the money. But they’re our people, Riel.”
“I hope so,” he said. His lips were tight. She wondered if he thought he should be in command.
“Besides, Dad always said the government reimbursement schedules were generous. There’ll be a little left over after you order the supplies.”
“I hope that, too. All right—I’ll place the order right away. Four additional. When are you coming back up?”
“When I arrange financing for the repairs. Let me speak toQuincy—” Riel cutQuincyinto the circuit, and Ky spoke to her. “What’s your estimate now, anyway?”
“I can tell you more in another twenty-four hours. Teardown’s slow on this old girl. Last people who put ’er together meant her to stay that way. Listen, Captain, if there’s war brewing you’d best come back up here—it may be time to contact Vatta headquarters and arrange repairs through them. I know this wasn’t your assigned mission, but—”
She could just imagine her father’s reaction. “I’ll see what I can do here,” she said. “You don’t have the full specs on the repair yet anyway. I’ll be careful.” She signed off before either could say more, and came out of the booth. Zar handed her a hardcopy of the transfer; her implant agreed that the money was in the ship’s account. Maybe this was a sign that things would now go right.
“I’m sorry, Captain Vatta, but it’s against our policy to extend credit to independent captains for major repairs.” The Helmsward Yard had seemed the perfect combination of quality and value for their repairs. Until she said she needed to arrange financing.
“But I’m not an independent—I’m part of Vatta Transport, Ltd.”
“But your application states that you are incurring this risk as an individual…” The finance officer looked at her from under bushy gray brows. “Are you representing Vatta Transport, Ltd., or yourself?” It was clear he wasn’t entirely sure of her identity at this point.
Ky tried not to glare. “I am Kylara Vatta; my father is CFO of Vatta Ltd. But this particular venture is my idea—”
“In other words, you are applying as an individual, and it is as an individual that I must reluctantly refuse your application,” the finance officer said. “I have no doubt that you have your own reasons for doing this, but we simply do not extend credit to individuals.”
“But my family—”
“Is not in the contract, Captain. No, I’m sorry, we simply cannot do it. Good day.”
It was not a good day. It had not been a good day sinceQuincyhad called down to report that the misbehaving drive had cavitation scars “you could put a fist into.” Now it was more than squeezing out the fifty thousand credits for the sealed unit; this was going to take big money. It had become even less of a good day when the Captains’ Guild inquired delicately just how long Captain Vatta meant to stay and when Captain Vatta would like to settle her bill and with what. Ky reminded the desk clerk that Vatta Transport, Ltd.’s account was, in all stations, classified 5A, and thus had no limit, and found that the concern arose because she was not on the list sent to them yearly of expected Vatta arrivals. They agreed to retract their request when she was able to prove who she was, but the argument frayed her patience. It was clear from the streets that the threat of war had frayed everyone’s patience.
And now this. She walked out of the office with as much grace as she could muster and wondered what now. Her escort fell in beside her without a word. He had already suggested that she stay in the Captains’ Guild or return to her ship—for her own safety—and she had already refused. She had a contract… She now had the merchandise to fulfill that contract, but… she didn’t have enough money to repair the ship. She could get the merchandise—but then she couldn’t get it back to Belinta. Or she could get the ship repaired enough to make it back, without the merchandise.
It was like those logic problems in children’s activity cubes, where a problem seemed impossible unless you looked at it in a very different way.
Ship or merchandise? Impossible, which meant it had to be the wrong question. She could not—would not—renege on her deal with the Belinta Economic Development Bureau. That would foul the family name even though she had taken on the contract as an individual. Vatta would come through; Vatta had to come through. So there had to be some way to get the merchandise and the repair; she just hadn’t thought of it yet.
The obvious thing was to call home—tell Vatta Transport, Ltd., what the problem was. They would bail her out; she knew that. But it would be, if not a black mark, a gray one. She had not followed the plan laid out for her, and even if Gary and Quincy had made it clear no one really expected her to take the ship tamely to Lastway, her decisions had led to a problem. A problem involving cash flow, which was… embarrassing. She hadn’t overspent an allowance since she was nine and bought all that candy for visiting cousins.
She really wanted to find a better way. There wasn’t a better way. If she didn’t want to renege on the contract and she didn’t want to risk spreading herself and her crew in a fine dust somewhere in deepspace, she had to have more money and no one, on the brink of a war, was going to lend it to an independent.
Back at the Captains’ Guild she ignored the desk staff and went up to her room. Best get it over with. She set up the room’s secure comdesk for an intersystem call and waited for the access light to go green. While she waited—on these smaller worlds, it could take a few minutes—she kicked off her shoes and hung her dress cape in the closet. The room seemed stuffy after the crisp air outside, but the windows didn’t open. Shrugging, she sat on the end of the bed and massaged her feet, with one eye on the comdesk. The little voice in her head ran through all the things her father might say and the tone of voice he might use, and she carried on a long imaginary conversation defending her actions so far.